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Image copyright Reuters Philip Hammond has a difficult trick to pull off this week. On the one hand – come clean: the government’s not keeping its promises on the public finances. On the other hand – convince us: the government is serious about the public finances. The government was elected with three promises at the heart of its economic plans. Cap welfare spending. Reduce public sector debt as a proportion of the economy, starting last year. And get into surplus, so its income exceeded its spending, by 2019/20 – staying […]

Image copyright PA Image caption A tricky situation for Robert Chote, head of the Office for Budget Responsibility You have to feel the Office for Budget Responsibility’s pain. By next Tuesday, the OBR has to come up with forecasts of what will happen to the UK economy and the government finances over the next five years. The Act of Parliament that created the OBR said that its forecasts had to be based on government policies and “may not consider what the effect of any alternative policies would be”. And here […]

Image copyright EPA The prime minister seemed pleased with the outcome of her trade visit to India. Theresa May said the 33-strong delegation had sealed deals worth £1bn, laying the groundwork for more than 1,300 jobs in the UK. Mrs May even donned a sari on a visit to a Hindu temple in the southern city of Bangalore, mixing the traditional with the modern. Bangalore has now become an important IT base for many other countries. Yet in India, they’re not so sure. Her reception was polite, with Prime Minister […]

Image caption The tree-filled Appalachian mountains of West Virginia are home to America’s coal region The vacant store fronts of low buildings line Delbarton’s main street. A town once thriving on money from the coal industry is now fighting for its existence. Delbarton is typical of many towns in West Virginia, built on coal and suffering as the industry shrinks. Former miner Bo Copley knows this struggle firsthand. In September 2015 he was laid off from his job at a coal mine. He is one of nearly 200,000 people who […]

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Mark Carney has “star quality and knows how to use it,” says Scott Reid Bank of England governor Mark Carney has said he will be staying on an extra year after his initial term comes to an end in 2018, to help oversee the UK’s Brexit negotiations with the European Union. Mr Carney’s decision came after increasing speculation about his future as the head of the Bank of England. Governors are traditionally appointed for an eight-year term, but when Mr Carney took the job […]

Image caption Jeans are an iconic symbol of American fashion Monte Galbraith has worked in the denim industry since he was a teenager. The 40-year veteran of the trade claims to have the indigo dye of blue jeans running through his veins. Like many in Columbus, Georgia – a city on the banks of Chattahoochee River along the state’s western border – Mr Galbraith followed his father into the textile mills. Unlike most, he still works in the industry. Columbus was once home to nine large textile mills, employing an […]

Image caption These days many of Macae’s boats are either beached or moored There has been a surge of food trucks recently in Macae, a city that calls itself Brazil’s “oil capital”. At first glance, it makes sense that in this seaside town with its beach culture, there would be plenty of street food vendors selling to both tourists and residents. But many of them did not open because entrepreneurs were discovering a new niche. These trucks belong to people who have lost their jobs and used their compensation money […]

The claim: The falling pound has made the UK the world’s sixth biggest economy, down from fifth. Reality Check verdict: The World Bank produces the rankings which are based on average exchange rates over the period. The UK has not fallen behind France so far. Figures as diverse as Jeremy Corbyn, the Labour leader, and Lord Livingston, the former Conservative trade minister, have said the UK has slipped down the rankings and is now the sixth-largest economy in the world. In an article in the Telegraph, former trade minister Lord […]

Image copyright Getty Images Women work on average 39 more days a year than men according to the World Economic Forum. Women work on average 50 minutes more a day than men, data from the WEF’s Global Gender Gap report suggests. The report says the prevalence of unpaid work burdens women and estimates that economic inequalities between the sexes could take 170 years to close. The gap in economic opportunity, the WEF says, is now larger than at any point since 2008. Nearly a quarter of a billion women have […]

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Tesco’s recent spat with Unilever has highlighted fears of a new inflationary surge The downward pressure on the pound since the UK’s vote to leave the European Union is starting to lead to upward pressure on the prices of most things we buy. Brexit, as we have been told by the prime minister, means Brexit. But inflation also means inflation. The pound has repeatedly lurched lower in value since the outcome of the June 2016 referendum. Against the dollar, it is now worth 20% […]